United States v. White’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

37 federal appellate · 3 district · 8 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 52 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “* * * when, as here, it appears in the record that the sentencing judge is not penalizing the defendant for having exercised his right to appeal, the imposition of a greater sentence upon reeonviction does not constitute a denial of due process and that such action lies within the discretion of the district judge. Similarly, as to the defendant’s double jeopardy argument * * * (p. 448)”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Coke v. United States · Moon v. State

2. ““The trial judge below concluded, 'No prisoner should be punished for obtaining a new trial nor for pleading not guilty.’ However, the record does not disclose that he was. “* * * [To hold that the trial judge will certainly increase the sentence after a new trial] would seem to trespass the integrity of the trial judge who, upon hearing all the evidence, with the whole panorama of defendant’s crime laid out before him, conscientiously passes sentence in accordance therewith, even though here the defendant did not take the stand nor call witnesses on his behalf. The sentence thus imposed by the trial judge cannot, in any sense, be said to be for his appealing, unless we again attribute to him a base motive—penalizing him for his appeal, conduct unworthy of the name of judge—rather than for his weighing and evaluating the measure of defendant’s crime and passing sentence thereon, in the light of the wider, factual area encompassed by the trial which, in most instances, is far more revealing than those factual elements taken into consideration in the imposition of sentence upon a plea of guilty. * * * “* * * Undoubtedly, it would therefore seem to be the rule in the federal system that a trial judge, when a new trial is ordered, may impose a sentence greater than one he had earlier vacated, and that it is unnecessary to articulate the reason for any differentiation in the term of the sentence. Furthermore, it has always been the rule in both the federal and state system that le”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Moon v. State

3. ““* * * in order to prevent abuses, the fixed policy must necessarily be that the new sentence shall not exceed the old. Seldom will this policy result in inadequate punishment. Against the rare possibility of inadequacy, greater weight must be given to the danger inherent in a system permitting stiffer sentences on retrial — that the added punishment was in reaction to the defendant’s temerity in attacking the original conviction. Even the appearance of improper motivation is a disservice to the administration of justice. ****** “To summarize, we conclude that increasing Patton’s punishment after the reversal of his initial conviction constitutes a violation of his Fourteenth Amendment rights in that it exacted an unconstitutional condition to the exercise of his right to a fair trial, arbitrarily denied Mm the equal protection of the law, and placed Mm twice in jeopardy of punishment for the same offense. “We affirm the District Court’s order to release the defendant from confinement uMess he is constitutionally resentenced by the state court to a term not exceeding 20 years from the date of Ms original sentence, passed on October 26, 1960, with full credit for the time already served.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 1 Tenn. Crim. App. 462 - Brown v. State